Former Oklahoma City teacher Joe Quigley says second termination was unfair

Quigley's resignation stemmed from a new recommendation for termination from his new principal, Brian Staples.

“The long and short of it was that it became more and more obvious that the intention was to build a case for a second attempt at dismissal, and my short comings as listed in the recommendation for this second attempt went beyond those things relating to me professionally,” Quigley wrote in an e-mail to The Oklahoman.

Since an Oklahoma County District Court judge ruled Quigley had been wrongfully terminated in 2009 and he was ordered to be reinstated, he has had a tumultuous career.

He was placed at U.S. Grant High School after the court order, but was removed from that school under a school-improvement plan that required at least half of the school's teachers be replaced.

Quigley was put into a pool of full-time substitutes, until he was offered a position at Douglass.

Now he feels as though he was set up to fail in his new position.

“Those of us who came from Grant should have been allowed time to relearn and apply what was new to us,” Quigley wrote. “The indication that something was in the works became evident when the simplest violation of a procedure, such as forgetting to lock the classroom door at the beginning of class, was not addressed in an informal way, but, rather was mentioned in e-mails, copies of which were sent to central administration personnel.”